Method and system automatically to support multiple transaction types, and to display seller-specific transactions of various transaction types in an integrated, commingled listing

ABSTRACT

This invention provides for a method of (or apparatus for) facilitating the display of items of multiple transaction types in a commingled listing. The display of items of multiple transaction types in a commingled listing may include items which are being offered by a specific Seller at a network based commerce facility.

RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a continuation application of U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 10/023,583, filed Dec. 14, 2001, which is relatedto and claims the priority benefit of provisional application for patentU.S. Provisional Application No. 60/297,665, filed Jun. 11, 2001.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to the field of electroniccommerce, and more specifically to a method and system for facilitatingan electronic commerce transaction.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

More and more Internet users are realizing the ease and convenience ofbuying and selling online by way of person-to-person online tradingpioneered by eBay Inc., the assignee of the present invention. As aresult, collectors, hobbyists, small dealers, unique item seekers,bargain hunters, and other consumers, are able to buy and sell millionsof items at various online shopping sites.

The success of an online shopping site depends upon its ability toprovide an enjoyable shopping experience and an easy-to-use environmentin which buyers and sellers can conduct business efficiently. Currentonline shopping sites have certain limitations in the manner in whichthey present information to users. With reference to FIG. 1, a typicalitem listing will briefly be described. A textual list of items 105representing the results of a user query is presented within a web pageformat 100 to the user (e.g., a prospective buyer) on his/her computersystem. In this example, the web page format 100 presented to theprospective buyer includes items 110 that are currently available forsale on a particular page 170 within a particular category. Each item110 includes a hypertext link 115 having a title (or brief description)of the item for sale, an indication 120 of whether or not an image ofthe item is available, the current minimum bid 130, the number of bidsreceived 140, and an auction ending time 150. Based upon the itemtitles, prospective buyers can decide whether or not to view moredetailed information on a particular item. In order to view detailedinformation on a particular item of interest, the buyer is required toselect the hypertext link 115 associated with the item. A new page isthen presented with more detailed information regarding the itemselected. The more detailed information may include, among other things,the item's starting price, a username associated with the seller of theitem, a username associated with the current high bidder, a detaileddescription of the item in text or HTML format, and an image the sellerhas associated with the item, for example.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

According to one aspect of the invention, there is provided a method tofacilitate a transaction by a network-based transaction facility. In oneembodiment, the method includes receiving a request from a buyeraccessing the network-based transaction facility to view offerings thatare offered for sale via the network-based transaction facility. Themethod further includes responding to the request by retrievinginformation concerning a plurality of offerings , wherein the pluralityof offerings include a first offering of a first transaction type and asecond offering of a second transaction type. Further, the methodincludes integrating information concerning the first and secondofferings into a commingled list and causing the display of thecommingled list to the buyer.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention is illustrated by way of example and notlimitation in the figures of the accompanying drawings, in which likereferences indicate similar elements and in which:

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary user interface that contains a listingof offerings that are the subjects of commerce transactions.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary network-basedtransaction facility in the form of a network-based auction facility 10.

FIG. 3 is a database diagram illustrating an exemplary database,maintained and accessed via a database engine server, which at leastpartially implements and supports the auction facility.

FIG. 4 is a representation of an item table, according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a method, according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention, of displaying a commingled ofitems.

FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplary user interface that contains a hyperlinkto a user interface from which a Buyer can choose a Seller's virtualstore

FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary user interface that contains a listingof Seller virtual stores in a network based commerce facility.

FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary user interface that contains a listingof Seller virtual stores, where the listing is based on a category (e.g.Real Estate) of Seller virtual stores.

FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary user interface that contains a listingof offerings for a specific Seller's virtual store, where the listing iscommingled list of items of multiple transaction types.

FIG. 10 is a flow chart illustrating a method according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention, of displaying a commingled list ofitems offered by a specific Seller's virtual store, where the commingledlisting of items meet a Buyer's search criteria.

FIG. 11 illustrates an exemplary user interface with a commingledlisting of items offered by a specific Seller's virtual store, where thecommingled listing of items meet a Buyer's search criteria.

FIG. 12 is a flow chart illustrating a method according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention, of displaying a commingled list ofitems offered at a Seller's virtual store, where the commingled list maybe filtered so that only items which meet a specific transaction type(e.g. Auction Items, Fixed Price Items) are displayed.

FIG. 13 illustrates an exemplary interface where a Buyer has selected“View Buy It Now Items” from the interface 900 of FIG. 9.

FIG. 14 is a flow chart illustrating a method according to an exemplaryembodiment of the present invention, of displaying a commingled of itemsoffered at a Seller's virtual store, where the items are sortedaccording to a specific criteria (e.g. price).

FIG. 15 is a diagrammatic representation of a machine in the exemplaryfor the computer system within which a set of instructions for causingmachine to perform any one of the methodologies of the invention may beexecuted.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

A method and system automatically to support multiple transaction types,and to display seller-specific transactions of various transaction typesin an integrated, commingled listing are described. In the followingdescription, for purposes of explanation, numerous specific details areset forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the presentinvention. It will be evident, however, to one skilled in the art thatthe present invention may be practiced without these specific details.

Terminology

For the purposes of the present specification, the term “transaction”shall be taken to include any communications between two or moreentities and shall be construed to include commercial transactionsincluding sale and purchase transactions, auctions and the like. Theterm “offering” shall be taken to include any products, services orgoods that are made available for purchase, or offered for sale. Whilean exemplary embodiment of the present invention is discussed below withreference to “items”, it will be appreciated that the present inventionis not so limited.

Transaction Facility

FIG. 2 is block diagram illustrating an exemplary network-basedtransaction facility 10. While an exemplary embodiment of the presentinvention is described within the context of a transaction facility, theinvention will find application in many different types ofcomputer-based, and network-based, commerce facilities.

The transaction facility 10, in an exemplary embodiment, includes one ormore of a number of types of front-end servers that each include atleast one Dynamic Link Library (DLL) to provide certain functionality.Page servers 12 deliver web pages (e.g., markup language documents),picture servers 14 dynamically deliver images to be displayed within Webpages, listing servers 16 facilitate category-based browsing ofofferings, search servers 20 that handle search requests to the facility10 and facilitate keyword-based browsing of offerings, and CGI or ISAPIservers 18 provide an intelligent interface to the back-end of facility10. E-mail servers 21 provide, inter alia, automated e-mailcommunications to users of the facility 10.

The page servers 12, picture servers 14, CGI/ISAPI servers 18, searchservers 20, e-mail servers 21 and database engine server 22 mayindividually, or in combination, act as a communication engine tofacilitate communications between, for example, the client machine 32and the network-based transaction facility 10. In addition, the pageservers 12, picture servers 14, CGI/ISAPI servers 18, search servers 20,e-mail servers 21 and database engine server 22 may individually, or incombination, act as a transaction engine to facilitate transactionsbetween, for example, the client machine 32 and the network-basedtransaction facility 10. Furthermore, the page servers 12, pictureservers 14, CGI/ISAPI servers 18, search servers 20, e-mail servers 21and database engine server 22 may individually, or in combination, actas a display engine to facilitate the display of items between, forexample, the client machine 32 and the network-based transactionfacility 10.

The back-end servers include a database engine server 22, a search indexserver 24 and a credit card database server 26, each of which maintainsand facilitates access to a respective database.

The Network-based transaction facility 10 may be accessed by a clientprogram 30, such as a browser (e.g., the Internet Explorer distributedby Microsoft Corp. of Redmond, Washington) that executes on a clientmachine 32 and accesses the facility 10 via a network such as, forexample, the Internet 34. Other examples of networks that a client mayutilize to access the transaction facility 10 include a wide areanetwork (WAN), a local area network (LAN), a wireless network (e.g., acellular network), or the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN)network.

Database Structure

FIG. 3 is a database diagram illustrating an exemplary database 23,maintain by and accessed via the database engine server 22, which atleast partially implements and supports the transaction facility 10. Inthe exemplary embodiment, the database engine server 22 maintains twodatabases 23 _(a) and 22 _(b), a first database 23 _(a) being maintainedfor offering information that is not included within a virtual “store”according to the present invention, with a second database 23 _(b)storing offering information for offerings that are presented viavirtual “stores”. The structure of these databases 23 _(a) and 22 _(e)are substantially the same, but differ in that the tables of the “store”database 23 _(e) may include a number of additional fields to facilitatethe virtual stores. A general discussion of the basic structure of adatabase 23 is presented below, this being applicable to both databases23 _(a) and 22 _(b.)

The database 23 may, in one embodiment, be implemented as a relationaldatabase, and includes a number of tables having entries, or records,that are linked by indices and keys. In an alternative embodiment, thedatabase 23 may be implemented as collection of objects in anobject-oriented database.

Central to the database 23 is a user table 40, which contains a recordfor each user of the transaction facility 10. A user may operate as aseller, buyer, or both, within the transaction facility 10. The database23 also includes items tables 42 that may be linked to the user table40. The items tables 42 may include a seller items table 44 and a bidderitems table 46. A user record in the user table 40 may be linked tomultiple items that are being, or have been, auctioned or otherwiseoffered for sale via the facility 10. A link indicates whether the useris a seller or a bidder (or buyer) with respect to items for whichrecords exist within the items tables 42.

The database 23 also includes one or more category tables 47. Eachrecord within the category table 47 describes a respective category. Inone embodiment, a specific category table 47 describes multiple,hierarchical category structures, and includes multiple categoryrecords, each of which describes the context of a particular categorywithin the one of the multiple hierarchical category structures. Forexample, the category table 47 may describe a number of real, or actual,categories to which item records, within the items tables 42, may belinked.

The database 23 also includes a note table 48 populated with noterecords that may be linked to one or more item records within the itemstables 42 and/or to one or more user records within the user table 40.Each note record within the table 48 may include, inter alia, a comment,description, history or other information pertaining to an item beingauction via the transaction facility 10, or to a user of the transactionfacility 10.

A number of other tables are also shown to be linked to the user table40, namely a user past aliases table 50, a feedback table 52, a feedbackdetails table 53, a bids table 54, an accounts table 56, an accountbalances table 58 and a transaction record table 60.

FIG. 4 is a diagrammatic representation of an items table 42, accordingto an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. The items table 42is shown to define a number of fields for each record that describes anitem being offered for sale via the transaction facility 10. A sale typefield 62 records the type of item (e.g., auction, fixed-price). In oneembodiment, the type of item indicates a price-setting process via whicha price for the relevant items may be established. Also, a storefrontflag field 64 designates whether an item in the network-basedtransaction facility 10 is offered at a Seller's virtual store.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart illustrating a method 70, according to anexemplary embodiment of the present invention, of locating anddisplaying a plurality of items offered by a Seller where the items areof a plurality of transaction types. In the exemplary method 70, thepresentation of the commingled list is the presentation of thecommingled list on a user graphical interface. The plurality of itemsavailable are recorded within the items table 42 of the database 23.

The plurality of items includes a first offering of a first transactiontype and a second offering of a second transaction type. The firsttransaction type implements a first price setting process and the secondtransaction type implements a second price setting process. At least oneof the first and second price-setting processes includes a fixedprice-setting process, an auction price-setting process, and a hybridauction/fixed price-setting process.

The fixed price-setting process provides items with a price that doesnot change after listing, and which allows buyers to purchase quantitiesof the item instead of going through an auction process. The initialquantity of a fixed-priced item can be one or more. The auctionprice-setting process allows multiple users (e.g. ,Buyers) to bid onitems for a fixed period of time after which the user with the highestbid may buy the item at a submitted bid price. The hybrid auction/fixedprice setting process allows a Buyer to purchase an item at a fixedprice before an initial bid can be placed on an item. Buy It Now items(BIN) are items in an auction that have a quantity of one, but also haveboth an initial bid amount and a BIN amount. Before any bids are placedon an item, a buyer can go through the BIN process to immediately endthe auction and win the item by agreeing to pay the BIN price. If abuyer bids on the auction, the item converts to a normal auction and nolonger has a BIN price or allows a BIN process.

Returning now specifically to the flow chart, at block 71, thenetwork-based transaction facility 10 receives a buyer's request to viewthe items in a seller's virtual store. FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplaryuser interface that includes a “Stores” portion. If selected the“Stores” portion 601 provides the user with an interface which allowsusers to select a seller's virtual store from a listing of featuredstores or from listing of stores provided according to category (e.g.books, antiques). In response to a Buyer selecting “Stores” from theexemplary interface provided in FIG. 6, the exemplary interface 700 ofFIG. 7 is provided. FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary user interface thatallows a user to select a seller's virtual store from a listing offeatured stores 701 or from listings of stores provided according tocategory 702. A Buyer may select a featured store 701 or select acategory 702 of stores to view. Upon choosing a category 702 of stores(e.g. Real Estate) the Buyer is further provided with an interfacedisplaying a list of stores based on the category selected. FIG. 8illustrates an exemplary interface 800 at which a listing of storesbased on a category is chosen. The Buyer may select a specific Seller'svirtual store from the interface 800 of FIG. 8.

The Seller's virtual store may consist of multiple items of multipletransaction types (e.g. fixed price-setting process, auctionprice-setting process, or hybrid auction/fixed price setting process).The Seller's virtual store items are items listed by virtual store owner(e.g., Seller). FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary interface 900 of aSeller's virtual store according to one embodiment. The Seller's virtualstore interface 900 has a different display from the core listings (e.g.network based auction home page). There is a Store logo 901 and Storename 902 on top of every Store specific listings page. All the brandingbar tabs for each Seller's virtual store is constructed and displayed onthe top of the Stores listings page.

Returning now specifically to the flow chart, at block 72, responsive tothe Buyer selecting a Seller's virtual store, a look-up is performedwithin the database 23, and specifically on the items table 42, toobtain a title and other details (e.g. transaction type, price)regarding one or more items that are available at the Seller's virtualstore selected by the Buyer. The items which are offered at the Seller'svirtual store may be of multiple transaction types.

After locating an item, at block 73 the item is retrieved. Retrievingthe item includes retrieving additional information (e.g. title,description, price, end of auction time, thumbnail image, number ofbids, applicable icons) associated with the item. As the items ofmultiple transaction types are retrieved, at block 74 they areintegrated into a commingled list. The list is known as a commingledlist because the items may be of multiple transaction types. At block75, a determination is made as to whether the end of the items table 42in the database 23 has been reached. Following a negative determinationat decision block 75, the method 70 loops back to block 72 and thesearch of the items table 42 in the database 23 for items being offeredby the Seller's virtual store continues.

On the other hand, following a positive determination at decision block75, the method proceeds to block 76, where a commingled list isdisplayed for the buyer on a user graphical interface. Referring brieflyback to FIG. 9, an exemplary embodiment of a commingled listing of items903 in a Seller's virtual store interface 900 is provided.

The Buyer may reduce the number of items in the commingled list byrequesting that only items which meet a certain search criteria are tobe displayed. Also, the Buyer may request to display only those items inthe commingled list, which meet a specific transaction type (e.g.Auction Items, Fixed Price Items). Furthermore, the Buyer may sort thecommingled list (e.g. according to price). The exemplary interface 900illustrated in FIG. 9 includes a “Search” portion 904, an “All Items”portion 905, a “View Auction Items” portion 906, “View Buy It Now Items”portion 907, a Price portion 908, an End Time portion 909, and a Bidsportion 910. The commingled list of items 903 may exist on multiplepages where each page will display a variable number of items includedin the commingled list. In an exemplary embodiment, each page mayinclude as many as 50 items per page.

FIG. 10 is a flow chart illustrating a method 110, according to anexemplary embodiment of the present invention, of displaying acommingled of items offered at a Seller's virtual store, where the itemsoffered meet a search criteria provided by the Buyer. The method 110shall be described within the context of the exemplary user interface900 shown in FIG. 9.

At block 111, the network based auction facility 10 accepts a searchcriteria from a buyer, where the Buyer is attempting to search for itemswhich meet a specific search criteria in a specific Seller' virtualstore. At interface 900, the search criteria are entered at a “Search”portion 904. In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, at block 112,the items table 42 of the Stores database 23 is searched for items inthe Specific Seller's virtual store that meet the search criteriaprovided by the buyer. The keywords would be used to search the Seller'svirtual store by item title or item description. Items located in theItems table 42 of the Database 23 which belong to the Seller are furtherinspected to determine if they meet the search criteria entered by theBuyer. At block 113, the search returns a list of all items offered bythe Seller's virtual store and displays the items at the Buyer'sinterface. FIG. 11 illustrates an exemplary interface 1100 with acommingled listing of items 1101 offered by a specific Seller's virtualstore, where the commingled listing of items meet a Buyer's searchcriteria.

FIG. 12 is a flow chart illustrating a method 120, according to anexemplary embodiment of the present invention, of displaying acommingled of items offered at a Seller's virtual store, where thecommingled list may be filtered so that only items which meet a specifictransaction type (e.g. Auction Items, Fixed Price Items) are displayed.The method 121 shall be described within the context of the exemplaryuser interface 900 shown in FIG. 9 as generated by the method 70described above with reference to FIG. 5.

At block 121, the network based auction facility 10 receives a buyer'srequest to view the items in a seller's virtual store. At block 122, asdescribed above by the method 70 with reference to FIG. 4, a commingledlist of items 903 offered by the Seller's virtual store is provided atthe Buyer's graphical user interface.

In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, at block 123, a Buyer mayselect “View Auction Items” 906 or “View Buy It Now Items” 907 to viewonly those items in the commingled list that meet a specific transactiontype (e.g. Auction Items, Fixed-Price Items). In the exemplary method,at block 124, if the Buyer selects “View Auction Items” a lookup of theitems table 42 in the database 23 is performed and all auction itemsoffered at the Seller's store are displayed for the Buyer. The Buyer mayselect “View All Items” to return to the commingled list of all itemsdisplayed at the interface 900 of FIG. 9.

In the exemplary method, at block 125, if the Buyer selects “View Buy ItNow Items” 907, a lookup of the items table 42 in the database 23 isperformed and all fixed price items and auction items which have afixed-price option before bidding has begun on the item will bedisplayed for the Buyer in a commingled list. If the item is only beingoffered at a fixed-price there will be no end time listed. However, ifthe item is an item that becomes an auction item after a first bid isentered, it will have an end time listed. FIG. 13 illustrates anexemplary interface 1301 (?) where a Buyer has selected “View Buy It NowItems” from the interface 900 of FIG. 9. The Buyer may select “View AllItems” 1301 to return to the commingled list of all items displayed atthe interface 900 of FIG. 9. The Buyer may further enter a keywordsearch after selecting the “View Auction Items” option or the “Buy ItNow Items” option to view only those items that meet search wordcriteria.

FIG. 14 is a flow chart illustrating a method 150, according to anexemplary embodiment of the present invention, of displaying acommingled of items offered at a Seller's virtual store, where the itemsare sorted according to a specific criteria (e.g. price). The method 150shall be described within the context of the exemplary user interface900 shown in FIG. 9 as generated by the method 70 described above withreference to FIG. 5.

At block 151, the network based auction facility 10 receives a buyer'srequest to view the items in a seller's virtual store. At block 152, asdescribed above by the method 70 with reference to FIG. 5, a commingledlist of items 903 offered by the Seller's virtual store is provided atthe Buyer's graphical user interface.

In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, at block 153, a Buyer mayselect a sort criteria (e.g. Price, Bids, End Time). At block 124, thecommingled list will be displayed according to the sort criteriaselected.

The above-described embodiment of the present invention assumes acentral network-based auction facility 10 that maintains a centraldatabase 23 of users and offerings. It will however be appreciated thatthe present invention may also be applied to a peer-to-peer tradingsystem implemented as applications executing on distributed computersystems that communicate via a network. In this case, the methods 70,110, 120, and 150 discussed above with reference to 4, 8, 9, and 12 maybe executed, for example, by an application program residing on acomputer system of a seller.

Further, while the exemplary embodiment of the present invention hasbeen discussed within the context of the network-based auction facility10, the teachings of the present invention may be implemented within anynetwork-based transaction system whereby transactions for the purchaseand/or sale of an offering are concluded between two or more parties

Software

FIG. 15 shows a diagrammatic representation of a machine in theexemplary form of a computer system 300 within which a set ofinstructions, for causing the machine to perform any one of themethodologies discussed above may be executed. In alternativeembodiments, the machine may comprise a network router, a networkswitch, a network bridge, Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), a cellulartelephone, a web appliance or any machine capable of executing asequence of instructions that specify actions to be taken by thatmachine.

The computer system 300 includes a processor 302, a main memory 304 anda static memory 306, which communicate with each other via a bus 308.The computer system 300 may further include a video display unit 310(e.g., a liquid crystal display (LCD) or a cathode ray tube (CRT)). Thecomputer system 300 also includes an alpha-numeric input device 312(e.g., a keyboard), a cursor control device 314 (e.g., a mouse), a diskdrive unit 316, a signal generation device 320 (e.g., a speaker) and anetwork interface device 322

The disk drive unit 316 includes a machine-readable medium 324 on whichis stored a set of instructions (i.e., software) 326 embodying any one,or all, of the methodologies described above. The software 326 is alsoshown to reside, completely or at least partially, within the mainmemory 304 and/or within the processor 302. The software 326 may furtherbe transmitted or received via the network interface device 322. For thepurposes of this specification, the term “machine-readable medium” shallbe taken to include any medium that is capable of storing or encoding asequence of instructions for execution by the machine and that cause themachine to perform any one of the methodologies of the presentinvention. The term “machine-readable medium” shall accordingly be takento included, but not be limited to, solid-state memories, optical andmagnetic disks, and carrier wave signals.

Thus, a method and system automatically to remind parties to anetwork-based transaction to comply with obligations established under atransaction agreement have been described. Although the presentinvention has been described with reference to specific exemplaryembodiments, various modifications and changes may be made to theseembodiments without departing from the broader spirit and scope of theinvention. Accordingly, the specification and drawings are to beregarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense.

1. A method to facilitate a transaction by a network-based transactionfacility, the method including: receiving a request from a buyeraccessing the network-based transaction facility to view offerings thatare offered for sale via the network-based transaction facility;responsive to the request, retrieving information concerning a pluralityof offerings, wherein the plurality of offerings include a firstoffering of a first transaction type and a second offering of a secondtransaction type; integrating information concerning the first andsecond offerings into a commingled list; and causing the display of thecommingled list to the buyer.